Abstract: Electroweak symmetry breaking explains the origin of the masses of elementary particles through their interactions with the Higgs field. Besides the measurements of the Higgs boson properties, the study of the scattering of massive vector bosons with spin 1 allows the nature of electroweak symmetry breaking to be probed. Among all processes related to vector-boson scattering, the electroweak production of two jets and a Z-boson pair is a rare and important one. Here we report the observation of this process from proton-proton collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139fb(-1) recorded at a centre-of-mass energy of 13TeV with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. We consider two different final states originating from the decays of the Z-boson pair: one containing four charged leptons and another containing two charged leptons and two neutrinos. The hypothesis of no electroweak production is rejected with a statistical significance of 5.7 sigma, and the measured cross-section for electroweak production is consistent with the Standard Model prediction. In addition, we report cross-sections for inclusive production of a Z-boson pair and two jets for the two final states.

Abstract: A search for dijet resonances in events with at least one isolated charged lepton is performed using 139 fb(-1) of root s = 13 TeV proton-proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The dijet invariant-mass (m(jj)) distribution constructed from events with at least one isolated electron or muon is searched in the region 0.22 < m(jj) < 6.3 TeV for excesses above a smoothly falling background from Standard Model processes. Triggering based on the presence of a lepton in the event reduces limitations imposed by minimum transverse momentum thresholds for triggering on jets. This approach allows smaller dijet invariant masses to be probed than in inclusive dijet searches, targeting a variety of new-physics models, for example ones in which a new state is produced in association with a leptonically decaying W or Z boson. No statistically significant deviation from the Standard Model background hypothesis is found. Limits on contributions from generic Gaussian signals with widths ranging from that determined by the detector resolution up to 15% of the resonance mass are obtained for dijet invariant masses ranging from 0.25 TeV to 6 TeV. Limits are set also in the context of several scenarios beyond the Standard Model, such as the Sequential Standard Model, a technicolor model, a charged Higgs boson model and a simplified Dark Matter model.

Abstract: Single top-quark production in association with a Z boson, where the Z boson decays to a pair of charged leptons, is measured in the trilepton channel. The proton-proton collision data collected by the ATLAS experiment from 2015 to 2018 at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV are used, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 139 fb(-1). Events containing three isolated charged leptons (electrons or muons) and two or three jets, one of which is identified as containing a b-hadron, are selected. The main backgrounds are from t (t) over barZ and diboson production. Neural networks are used to improve the background rejection and extract the signal. The measured cross-section for tl(+)l(-) q production, including non-resonant dilepton pairs with m(l+l-) > 30 GeV, is 97 +/- 13 (stat.) +/- 7 (syst.) fb, consistent with the Standard Model prediction.